Japan crisis - the worlds economic outlook?

FTBFun

ninky wrote: »

new zealand uses 70 percent renewable sources of power. then of course they have a sensible population density that the rest of us would be wise to emulate.

Not much of a comparison though - NZ has a lot of geothermal and hydro-electric power which isn't really possible in the UK, as we're miles away from tectonic plate boundaries and its not hilly enough for hydro-electric.

There are also 15 times as many people here. That isn't going to go down through strict birth control measures.

julieq

for some numbers, have a look at:

http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/osh/os/ostb2063.pdf

You can search for glass and find glass manufacturing broken down, and nuclear to find nuclear generation.

There are some caveats. Firstly these are injuries I think, not deaths, and reflect modern practice in the US. But just look how many more injuries there are proportionally in glass manufacture relative to nuclear power generation (incidence rate). That reflects the different emphasis on safety in the industry.

I can probably trawl up historic death rates in the glass industry, but it is unquestionably the case that fewer people massively have been killed or injured in nuclear accidents both in absolute and incidence rate terms than have been killed in the manufacture of glass.

Conclusion is obvious: double glazing is ARMAGEDDON. We must (carefully) remove all windows now.

ninky_2

julieq wrote: »

I make my living understanding risk Ninky, and I would quite happily live with my children next to a nuclear plant. It's a hell of a lot safer than living next to a main road both in terms of direct accidental death and in terms of danger via pollution.

many of us have jobs that involve risk assessment. so you have direct expert knowledge of nuclear power do you....more than i do?

or are you just being rather arrogant and dismissive considering you don't know me based merely on the fact i am disagreeing with your point of view?

of course a fully functional nuclear reactor is reasonably safe just as a road is safe if you don't get hit by a car....

but would you happily go to the area around the current failed reactor with your kids? rather than cross a main road?

Generali

ninky wrote: »

many of us have jobs that involve risk assessment. so you have direct expert knowledge of nuclear power do you....more than i do?

or are you just being rather arrogant and dismissive considering you don't know me based merely on the fact i am disagreeing with your point of view?

of course a fully functional nuclear reactor is reasonably safe just as a road is safe if you don't get hit by a car....

but would you happily go to the area around the current failed reactor with your kids? rather than cross a main road?

With respect, that argument shows how much you understand risk. That's like measuring road safety by pushing old ladies in front of lorries.

pompeyfaith

The FTSE was down 100 points on opening this morning, that is a pretty good indication that the Japan crisis will have a global effect on the rest of the world.

My son works at a uk honda dealership and they are already worried about fullfilling there order book and the lack of parts specially service items.

julieq

Yes, Ninky, I do work directly both with the nuclear industry and with the glass industry.

I'm not disagreeing with you for amusement, I'm disagreeing with you because you have no conception of relative risk, and you have bizarre ideas bordering on eugenics on how to make everything better which are not thought through. It's a debating board, right? Expect to be disagreed with.

ninky_2

Generali wrote: »

With respect, that argument shows how much you understand risk. That's like measuring road safety by pushing old ladies in front of lorries.

well apples and oranges. it was julieq who started the comparison of nuclear safety and road safety.

ninky_2

julieq wrote: »

Yes, Ninky, I do work directly both with the nuclear industry and with the glass industry.

I'm not disagreeing with you for amusement, I'm disagreeing with you because you have no conception of relative risk, and you have bizarre ideas bordering on eugenics on how to make everything better which are not thought through. It's a debating board, right? Expect to be disagreed with.

well we have no way of proving the accuracy of what you say either way. working directly with the nuclear and glass industry could mean any number of things.

nothing i've said borders on eugenics at all - birth control across the human population is not "eugenics". incidentally anyone who makes a conscious choice about who would make a good parent for their child could be accused of "eugenic" thinking.

with regards to risk it all comes down to opinion ultimately.

i don't mind being disagreed with. do you?

julieq

ninky wrote: »

well apples and oranges. it was julieq who started the comparison of nuclear safety and road safety.

But you're talking nonsense. Obviously it's more dangerous to stand next to a radiation source than next to a road, because you're comparing one case where the risk has transpired, and one case where the risk is nothing more than a probability. Similarly it is more dangerous to stand in front of a car about to hit you than next to a nuclear power station.

It is safer to stand next to a nuclear plant than it is to stand on the side of a main road. The probability of accident is higher on the main road, and the probability of harm due to pollution is higher on the main road.

You don't understand risk, and honestly you'd be far better off making emotive points (think of the children!) than trying to sustain unsustainable arguments. Risk reduction is about reducing the probability of an event by taking particular measures which may include multiple redundant safety systems, interlocks, what have you, and it's become extremely important in recent years not least because of the rise of health and safety regulation and associated litigation. And because nuclear plant technicians also tend to live near to the plants are are rightly concerned about their own families.

It's not perfect, but most of what you do every day is more dangerous than nuclear power by many orders of magnitude.

julieq

ninky wrote: »

well we have no way of proving the accuracy of what you say either way. working directly with the nuclear and glass industry could mean any number of things.
...

with regards to risk it all comes down to opinion ultimately.

i don't mind being disagreed with. do you?

What I say is verifiable fact. It doesn't honestly matter whether or not I work in any particular sector, because what I say is true and you can check it. You've persuaded yourself that your irrational position is true, but it doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

Risk has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with opinion. It's about probability and mitigation. Now obviously you may choose to live next to a road rather than a nuclear power plant because you fear the possibility of harm via radiation more than you fear the prospect of breathing in carbon monoxide, but the risks of either are measurable and you have them the wrong way round.